Category: Social media

Tweet Tweet

Posted on by Brian Lee

I, like many others, use Twitter as a news source.  Because I am a creature of convenience, I follow my favorite news outlets and am able to browse all of them in one stop.  It’s amazingly efficient and I would highly recommend condensing your news surfing through Twitters!

That being said, it concerns me how frequently Twitter itself is news.  Maybe it’s my secret addiction to entertainment news (I blame my mother and her insistence on watching Entertainment Tonight), but I have noticed an increasing amount of people reporting on what someone tweeted as a news story.

It’s a little weird to hear a story start, “So and so tweeted…”  It’s like someone releasing a statement, if that statement was a stream of consciousness ranging anywhere from the mundane to the inappropriate.

I wish this was a trend I could see going away but I know that just isn’t the case. How often do you hear about a celebrity or pro athlete putting their foot in their mouth on Twitter?  (Maybe I hear about it more because of my embarrassing habit of watching entertainment news channels…) As long as you give people the vehicle to say stupid things they will.  And as long as people say stupid things, someone will make a news story out of it.

Improving Edgerank in Facebook

Posted on by Brian Lee

I recently spoke on Facebook marketing at the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce’s annual expo. A key point I made was that don’t spend too much time worrying about the appearance of your Facebook page, as the vast majority of interaction with fans happens in the News Feed.

For those unfamiliar with Edgerank, it’s Facebook’s tool/formula to calculate which posts matter to you the most. In other words, have you ever noticed some friends ALWAYS appear near the top of your News Feed? It’s because you’ve interacted with them more than others, and Facebook keeps track.

Edgerank applies not only to personal pages, but to fan pages as well. I’ve created this chart to explain how to improve your Edgerank on the three main categories: Fan Engagement, Time with Status and Frequency of Posts.

Fan EngagementTime with StatusFrequency of Posts
No marketing messages or any other type of “broadcasting”Post videosPost no more than once every four hours
Ask questionsPost photosPost during peak Facebook hours; or
Elicit emotionsPost linksPost during your audience’s peak hours
Topical posts(All suggestions from first column)

The key takeaway is that good content should be your No. 1 goal to make your page more visible to your fans.

How AEC Marketers Can Use Pinterest

Posted on by Brian Lee

pinterestPinterest is one of the fastest growing social media sites. In January 2012, Pinterest became the fastest site in history to break through the 10 million unique visitor mark. The following month it broke into the top 30 websites in the country.

An increasing number of companies are turning to Pinterest to engage with their fans and ultimately drive traffic to their sites. Pinterest allows companies to create a visual representation of their brand by “pinning” content from around the web while integrating pins of their own products as well.

So how can AEC marketers use Pinterest? Here are some of the tips we came up with:

  • Pin photos of your firm’s buildings, designs, projects, etc.
  • Make sure to balance your firm’s photos with photos from other websites and blogs. Your pinboards are not supposed to be used solely for self-promotion.
  • If your company has a blog, make sure to pin any relevant images from the blog onto your pinboards. When users click on these images, they’ll be redirected straight to your blog.
  • Create other pinboards to keep track of inspirational photos, products you use and like, products you’d like to check out, materials, etc.
  • Add a full description of your company to the top of your page and include links to your other social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, etc.)
  • Most importantly, make your pinboards fun and visually appealing!

Rowland Broughton-Architecture in Aspen, Colo., has a great Pinterest account to check out: http://pinterest.com/rowlandb/. Notice the ample categories, the stunning, high-quality photos and the lack of (obvious) self-promotion.

For a good example of what NOT to do, take a look at Hammers Construction’s account: http://pinterest.com/tuknov/hammers-construction/. Notice how the company has only pinned photos of buildings it has made without integrating any outside media sources into its site, plus it didn’t categorize the photos.

For AEC marketers, Pinterest also has the opportunity to change the way you exchange ideas with your clients. The site is rumored to be adding private pinboards that are not available for the public to see in the very near future. This will allow you and your client to create private pinboards to exchange ideas and inspiration for current projects.

With a little bit of creativity and planning, Pinterest can be a great tool for promoting your company. Get out there and start pinning!

— This post was also published on the SMPS Wisconsin website.